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Imagine that beyond the heavenly system there existed some
solid mass, and that from this sphere there was directed to it a
vision utterly unimpeded and unrestricted: it is a question
whether that solid form could be perceived by what has no
sympathetic relation with it, since we have held that sympathetic
relation comes about in virtue of the nature inherent in some one
living being.
Obviously, if the sympathetic relationship depends upon the fact
that percipients and things perceived are all members of one
living being, no acts of perception could take place: that far
body could be known only if it were a member of this living
universe of ours- which condition being met, it certainly would
be. But what if, without being thus in membership, it were a
corporeal entity, exhibiting light and colour and the qualities
by which we perceive things, and belonging to the same ideal
category as the organ of vision?
If our supposition [of perception by sympathy] is true, there
would still be no perception- though we may be told that the
hypothesis is clearly untenable since there is absurdity in
supposing that sight can fail in grasping an illuminated object
lying before it, and that the other senses in the presence of
their particular objects remain unresponsive.
[The following passage, to nearly the end, is offered tentatively
as a possible help to the interpretation of an obscure and
corrupt place.]
[But why does such a failing appear impossible to us? We answer,
because here and now in all the act and experience of our senses,
we are within a unity, and members of it. What the conditions
would be otherwise, remains to be considered: if living sympathy
suffices the theory is established; if not, there are other
considerations to support it.
That every living being is self-sensitive allows of no doubt; if
the universe is a living being, no more need be said; and what is
true of the total must be true of the members, as inbound in that
one life.
But what if we are invited to accept the theory of knowledge by
likeness (rejecting knowledge by the self-sensitiveness of a
living unity)?
Awareness must be determined by the nature and character of the
living being in which it occurs; perception, then, means that the
likeness demanded by the hypothesis is within this self-identical
living being (and not in the object)- for the organ by which the
perception takes place is in the likeness of the living being (is
merely the agent adequately expressing the nature of the living
being): thus perception is reduced to a mental awareness by means
of organs akin to the object.
If, then, something that is a living whole perceives not its own
content but things like to its content, it must perceive them
under the conditions of that living whole; this means that, in so
far as it has perception, the objects appear not as its content
but as related to its content.
And the objects are thus perceived as related because the mind
itself has related them in order to make them amenable to its
handling: in other words the causative soul or mind in that other
sphere is utterly alien, and the things there, supposed to be
related to the content of this living whole, can be nothing to
our minds.]
This absurdity shows that the hypothesis contains a contradiction
which naturally leads to untenable results. In fact, under one
and the same heading, it presents mind and no mind, it makes
things kin and no kin, it confuses similar and dissimilar:
containing these irreconcilable elements, it amounts to no
hypothesis at all. At one and the same moment it postulates and
denies a soul, it tells of an All that is partial, of a something
which is at once distinct and not distinct, of a nothingness
which is no nothingness, of a complete thing that is incomplete:
the hypothesis therefore must be dismissed; no deduction is
possible where a thesis cancels its own propositions.
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